Metaphor Re Fantizio

[Jizaboz]

Sold 50$ of BTC to buy this game. Persona 5 was excellent, and apparently this game is "a new game with new story that plays like Persona".

First impressions after 100 minutes:

- This game isn't for everyone. If you hate dialogue and anime, you won't enjoy this. I recommend playing like I do with English subtitles and Japanese audio.
- Is it medieval? Yes, at least in the beginning. However, this medieval world is sort of like Wanderers from Ys. Deadly and filled with monsters and mystery.
- The combat is turn-based and wonderful. Everything feels natural despite being a new game with a lot of new aspects being introduced. Very tight. I've already caught myself staring at the victory screens admiring the design instead of hitting a button to continue.
- The music so far is mostly medieval sounding. No hip sounding tracks similar to Persona yet..
- Certain aspects of the game remind me of Phantasy Star; SEGA was involved with production.
- I don't regret my purchase.

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

I really want this one, I think I will snag it on sale. I can't do full price any more, personally, when it is above 50 bucks. But I am glad it is a good game!

[Jizaboz]

I really want this one, I think I will snag it on sale. I can't do full price any more, personally, when it is above 50 bucks. But I am glad it is a good game!

Oh I totally understand. If I didn't know this will be a 100+ hour game I would enjoy and didn't have some BTC to spare I wouldn't have bought it either for 69.99

[Jizaboz]

Now at 7.9 hours. Got to a place where you can "grind" so long as you manage things well and this is where things get really fun. Basically figuring out how to be as conservative as possible with magic points while killing as many things as possible while collecting random treasure until you run out of magic points and need to escape and rest. The "dungeons" haven't annoyed me yet like they started to in some Persona games, but we will see as the game progresses.

The music has remained "medieval" and it's growing on me despite not being what I expected at all from this company (Atlas). The somber battle-march music that plays as your team walks in slow motion across a blood trail showing how much exp/gold/etc you earned from a battle is fucking awesome. This game has a lot of creative style.

The different style of attacks was weird at first but oh man once you get how "synthesis" and other elements work, it's very satisfying exploiting both your own moves and enemy weaknesses once you learn things via trial and error. Speaking of which; that is made much easier in this game! If a battle becomes bullshit or you make a dumb mistake, you simply hit the "rewind time" button instead of going through menus to re-try or re-load the fight from the beginning.

The characters are cool too. Your main "best buddy" is basically a lot like Ryuji from Persona 5 which is neat if you played that one. The main dude you play resembles the main scrawny nerdy guy from P5. Beyond that, everyone feels like brand new people. The different races with long ears, horns, tails, etc remind me a bit of Phantasy Star. Even your companion fairy which in most other games is annoying as fuck is a cool character that serves her function.

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

I think in Persona 3 or 4 you were a high school or college student that had to go to class. Does that sound familiar? Are there "classes" in Metaphor?

[Jizaboz]

I think in Persona 3 or 4 you were a high school or college student that had to go to class. Does that sound familiar? Are there "classes" in Metaphor?

All of the Persona games take place in high school. This one does not. While there are no classes etc in this game you do have to still balance what you do in the day (like training a certain stat) with how much time you spend in dungeons or completing other quests.

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

Would you say it's BETTER than the Persona games??

[RealNC]

All of the Persona games take place in high school.

How short are the skirts? (Asking for a friend.)

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

I will start the Persona games I have and try to come up with some content and the real answers here.

[Jizaboz]

All of the Persona games take place in high school.

How short are the skirts? (Asking for a friend.)

A lot less of that in this game, but I have caught myself looking at my fairy companions butt as she flys around lol

[RealNC]

How short are the skirts? (Asking for a friend.)

A lot less of that in this game

Ah, bummer. My friend is disappointed.

[Jizaboz]

Took a break from this for about a week but back into it now. Currently level 22.

After a kinda frustrating dungeon (I resorted to looking at a guide for best setup for help) parts of the story are really starting to come together and it isgetting more and more interesting. I've just befriended this giant white rat knight dude with red eyes who seems to have been framed for a crime I was investigating due to a bounty.

One cool thing I noticed was that if 2 people in the party equip the same "class" then their combined Synthesis attacks get fucking insanely powerful.

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

Are the dungeons static? Thank you for posting about this game. I hope it gets discounted during the Thanksgiving Steam Sale.

[Jizaboz]

Are the dungeons static? Thank you for posting about this game.

They are! And at least so far don't seem as massive as many I encountered in the Persona games. The game really seems to be about learning from mistakes; such as the "rewind" feature in any combat.

Like, the first time I went through this cave I was trying to fight all this stuff along the way to grind a bit but come to find out in that area you should just dodge as much shit to avoid combat as you can while scooping up items, and then fighting a series of bosses. If you don't have the right setup, you'll get waxed or barely live. In contrast with the right one (such as stacking mage fire attacks on someone weak to fire) it can get downright stupid how much easier it is. It's really satisfying.

[Jizaboz]

My investigation uncovered severe royal corruption. I had a suspect nailed down, and infiltrated their castle! I made my way to the very top only to encounter another "human" who proceeded to fucking REK my party. Decided it was best to just warp out of the dungeon to rest up and get my MP back when I realize.. I've still got 11 DAYS left to kill that human boss!

This realization unlocked all kinds of shit when I went back to previous towns and revisited some NPCs and such. I can now play as "merchant" class which rakes in stupid amounts of money or you can spend money to deal damage with it. Trying to get my albino rodent friend's "friend rank" up within a couple of game days to unlock the "faker" class for him. Already did 2 side quests since..

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

They put it on sale for the Autumn sale, but I got Silent Hill 2 instead. I figured I'd get this for the Winter sale.

Well, they knocked it down 25% AGAIN this week. They win. I want it, I want it in my body inside me. Thanks to Jizzers for making me aware, gonna try it out this weekend.

[Jizaboz]

Haha hell yeah. I'm about 3/4s done with it at around 60 hours total trying to do as much as possible rather than rush. No regrets at all. Excellent SEGA game. I plan on finishing by Christmas so that I can fully enjoy re-living the Christmas Day I played Wizardry 7 for the first time and actually finish it by xmas of next year. That game and Cyberganked are literally the only CRPGs I want to finish at this point in life.

Just talking about Refantazio (correct spelling) lol makes me want to pick it up again tonight but I've got more work to do before I pass out. The music, theme, characters; it's all very spine chilling if you are into it. I don't think I even mentioned the slight "Transformers" sound it makes as you shift between human form and archetype form.

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

I think having the girl buzzing around you is a nice way to introduce people to this game, better than a narrator or whatnot.



I am getting the sense that now that JRPGs can have you strike something, they are happily ditching the concept where you take turns. Like, the Final Fantasy 7 remake did that. There is still cool downs, so it is KIND of like turn based stuff for some powers. But I could move Cloud around however I wanted. I don't know if this is an accurate observation. In this game, my unnamed protagonist can hit people, or run away, all in real time. I'll take it, I don't think I love the JRPG turn based combat. (I kind of have to love the western CRPG turn based combat because I am stuck making one.)

[Jizaboz]

Killin sand worms! Yeah, I actually like Gallica. Probably one of the most non-annoying fairies in a video game.

The "live" part of combat can be confusing or slightly frustrating at times. In a perfect scenario, you wack a monster 2-3 times until it's "stunned", THEN initiate the actual turn-based combat with a big advantage. With the FF7 remake, ALL combat is live unless you tick an option to make it all turn-based.. which I did. While turn-based combat in Metaphor is similar to FF7, it has a lot of neat things like "synthesis", passing instead of being forced to take an action (Maybe you want 1 of your 4 dudes to hit twice instead of everyone taking an action), and the turn icon system in general.

What do you think about the story/theme so far? Are you playing with English audio? I prefer Japanese audio with this company's games, so I really have no idea what the voice acting sounds like.

[Jizaboz]

70+ hours in! Surely we are reaching the end soon..

In a way I want to be done and move on to other games, on the other hand I'm still really enjoying it; especially after a sort of burst of new stuff (characters, upgrades, etc) after fighting "king" Louis again.